The Longest Day: The D-Day Story, June 6th, 1944 by Cornelius Ryan lands on the |> SALE <| shelves in my shop.

New Orchard, 1994, Hardback in dust wrapper.

First in this edition. [First: Victor Gollancz, 1960] Illustrated by way of: Black & White Photographs; Maps to the endpapers and blanks;

From the cover: 6 June, 1944. 156,000 troops from 12 different countries, 11,000 aircraft, 7,000 naval vessels, 24 hours. D-Day the beginning of the Allied invasion of Hitlers formidable Fortress Europe was the largest amphibious invasion in history.

There has never been a battle like it, before or since. But beyond the statistics and over sixty years on, what is it about the events of D-Day that remain so compelling? The courage of the men who fought and died on the beaches of France? The sheer boldness of the invasion plan? Or the fact that this, Rommels longest day, heralded the beginning of the end of World War II. One of the defining battles of the war, D-Day is scored into the imagination as the moment when the darkness of the Third Reich began to be swept away.

This is the story of D-Day, told through the voices of over 1,000 survivors from high-ranking Allied and German officers, to the paratroopers who landed in Normandy before dawn, the infantry who struggled ashore and the German troops who defended the coast.

Cornelius Ryan captures the horror and the glory of D-Day, relating in emotive and compelling detail the years of inspired tactical planning that led up to the invasion, its epic implementation and every stroke of luck and individual act of heroism that would later define the battle. In the words of its author, The Longest Day is a story not of war, but of the courage of man.

Good in Very Good Dust Wrapper. Dust wrapper damp-marked at the top edge of the reverse. Top edges of all the leaves are slightly tanned, tacky and lightly wrinkled possibly as a result of damp. Not unpleasant.